2E: Stealth Dyslexia: How do you educate differently?

[SophiaH]

The stealth dyslexia label fits dd to a 'T'--almost as if you could substitute in her name into the article. And I know it sounds crazy, but I'm pretty sure dd is an auditory-spatial learner, not VSL...but, possibly with an auditory processing disorder? Is that even possible? She has all of the symptoms on this checklist for the "tolerance/fading memory" subtype and the "decoding" subtype of APD, but she really seems to learn best through auditory means. She listens to audiobooks and educational CDs for hours a day, and loves listening to read-alouds. Those things are how she prefers to get her information, although she loves to read non-fiction--as long as she's allowed to do so silently and not out loud.

 

Some days she seems almost...normal. And other days, she ends up in tears of frustrations with herself because she "can't think straight." EVERYthing is a distraction for her--especially the thoughts in her own head. Is this common? How do I deal with this day-to-day inconsistency in ability to focus?

 

Her handwriting is terrible!!! Should I really focus on it this year, or just gradually keep trying to improve it as we go?

 

Her spelling is extremely poor, but we finally seem to making small strides using A&P. And actually, we're finishing up with REWARDS which has helped her decoding but has had the unexpected benefit of helping her encoding as well! Thank goodness for small miracles!

 

Do I just forget trying to teach her math facts, grammar terms, Latin vocabulary, and other "random" facts? I've tried finding "big picture" type curricula, which seem to be much more effective for her. Should I just try to tie everything into history, which she loves and with which she has wonderful understanding and recall? Would that help her retain those other "random" things?

 

I would love to hear other's experiences with their dc that seem to fit the stealth dyslexia label--how do you deal with some of these issues?

[zaichiki]

The stealth dyslexia label fits dd to a 'T'--almost as if you could substitute in her name into the article. And I know it sounds crazy, but I'm pretty sure dd is an auditory-spatial learner, not VSL...but, possibly with an auditory processing disorder? Is that even possible? She has all of the symptoms on this checklist for the "tolerance/fading memory" subtype and the "decoding" subtype of APD, but she really seems to learn best through auditory means.

 

*My dd could be described as having stealth dyslexia. She has dyseidetic dyslexia and she's an extremely auditory learner. She had an IQ test at 4, which placed her in the gifted category, but struggled to learn to read at 6. Interestingly, she was independently writing entire sentences, phonetically, at 3. The thing about that was that she couldn't read them back the next day. (These were all her own sentences and it was her own drive.) Something had to be up. Why was she still struggling with reading at 6? Her brothers were in chapter books at 5. Well... we found out.

 

she loves to read non-fiction--as long as she's allowed to do so silently and not out loud.

 

My dd also hates to read out loud. She's 9 now and reads slightly above grade level. If I ask her to read something aloud, she melts. I've started wondering if I should *make* her read aloud often. Is it a practice thing? Would it be good for her? Bad for her self esteem? She does lose her place in the line and skips words and goes back... I guess she compensates for that when she reads alone, but it's a problem if you're reading out loud.

 

Her spelling is extremely poor

My dd's is poor, too, but she has improved quite a bit using All About Spelling. Now, when she asks me how to spell something, we talk through how to figure it out. It's more than just phonics. She's got to know whether or not to double a certain letter before adding a suffix and she needs to know *why* and *when* in order to remember. That's where AAS comes in. It's been very useful. I just wish she didn't have to think through so many rules so often. It would be easier on her if she had some visual memory for these words. She sees them repeatedly. Sigh. (But that would be the dyseidetic dyslexia right there.)

 

Do I just forget trying to teach her math facts, grammar terms, Latin vocabulary, and other "random" facts? I've tried finding "big picture" type curricula, which seem to be much more effective for her. Should I just try to tie everything into history, which she loves and with which she has wonderful understanding and recall?

That sounds like just the ticket.

 

Would that help her retain those other "random" things?

I dunno.

 

My experience is with my dd, who has a great auditory memory. She is able to remember terms, facts, and vocabulary if she hears it. If she recites it, it's memorized quickly. (That must be where the giftedness comes in.) If it's put to music, she hardly needs ANY repetition at all. (She's a very strong auditory learner.)

 

I would love to hear other's experiences with their dc that seem to fit the stealth dyslexia label--how do you deal with some of these issues?

 

How do I deal? (I try not to think about it too much. That's honesty. Probably not the best way to deal, though.)

 

She still reverses numbers, letters, and symbols. Greater than and less than symbols in math are just always going to be 50/50 guessing. Yeah... that and left/right. I don't think she's ever going to know her right from her left. Sigh. We've even tried using her strengths for that one and it's going nowhere. NO clue what to do about that.

[Lyrical]

My almost 15 year old son has a dyslexia dx and his verbal IQ is superior. It's supremely frustrating because he has this verbal intelligence, but for all intents and purposes, he can't really show it. He also has dysgraphia and inattentive ADD, and it's very common for people with dyslexia to also have both dysgraphia and either ADD or ADHD.

 

When he got his dx, I became interested in dyslexia and ended up doing some graduate study with Susan Barton. She recommends that students learn keyboarding and give up on handwriting, and that they should not have to memorize anything ... dates, multiplication tables, formulas, etc. As for foreign language, what's recommended is ASL.

 

My son has been through the first 6 Barton Reading & Spelling levels, and I'd say his spelling is much better, reading about grade level, but we still struggle tremendously with writing. I think his problems with organization and attention really hit him hard in writing. I'm not sure what to do about this. I've thought about working with him, integrating something like Inspiration with IEW. He does attend a PS, and I wish he didn't, but he loves the activities, particularly band. ::sigh::

[PeterPan]

Well first off, I think you're ascribing a lot to dyslexia that isn't. She could also have ADD and executive dysfunction. My dd is very similar, wanting to learning visually (ie. a visual learner) but being weak enough in her visual processing (thanks to the dyslexia and years of unfixed vision problems) that she still benefits from the auditory help. End result is we find ourselves moving more and more toward videos, things with an auditory component, things on the computer (combined visual and auditory), etc. You'll just watch and see what she learns from next.

 

Honestly, we could sit here and tell you things, but I suggest you save yourself years of grief and just go get a neuropsych eval. Get her eyes checked as well by a developmental optometrist, just to rule that part out. (They can do a regular exam and just screen, or they can do a full eval.) The neuropych is the one who's going to parse through the working memory and whatnot for you. She clearly has some issues going on, and you might as well sort it out now as later.

 

The handwriting can be impacted by all kinds of stuff. My dd's issues were partly from low muscle tone, partly from her eyes (getting back to that developmental optometrist exam I'm encouraging you to get), and partly from some praxis issues. So we've had to work on each of those components. It wasn't like it was *one* issue. But again, the eyes made a huge difference for us. Cheaper than the neuropsych (at least for us), it's a good place to start. Ours screened for quite a few things and referred us off.

 

BTW, the kicker for us was when I realized she COULDN'T do the things the remediation programs for handwriting wanted her to do. There's a huge difference between won't, hasn't had the remedial instruction, and then CAN'T no matter how hard they try, kwim? That's what I'm saying. We waited too long at the "something is wrong but we don't know what so we keep plugging on" stage. Getting good evals enabled us to start making HUGE leaps and really target the problems, rather than shooting in the dark and perpetually trying stuff. I wish I had gotten the evals sooner, and I think most people would say the same thing.

Edited August 17, 2011 by OhElizabeth

[Lyrical]

Honestly, we could sit here and tell you things, but I suggest you save yourself years of grief and just go get a neuropsych eval.

:iagree:

[SophiaH]

We did have convergence issues with her vision and dd completed vision therapy in March. Her follow-up exam in June looked good but I've been having her use Brainware Safari to help, in particular, with her visual memory.

 

But, that was what I was wondering--is something else going on here? I guess a professional eval is the only way to know for sure. But then I wonder, what good will that do? Will it really give me any information that I could use to help dd (I'm sure it would), or would it just give me a "label"? Just thinking out loud here...

 

Thanks, OhE, for your always-helpful and always-candid advice. :)

[SophiaH]

Oh, I also wanted to thank both of you other ladies for your thoughts. It's so helpful for me to hear other's experiences. You've given me some new ideas.

[onaclairadeluna]

The stealth dyslexia label fits dd to a 'T'--almost as if you could substitute in her name into the article. And I know it sounds crazy, but I'm pretty sure dd is an auditory-spatial learner, not VSL...but, possibly with an auditory processing disorder? Is that even possible?

 

OK well that is what I have. Except when I thought my son had an auditory processing disorder it turned out I was wrong. His processing is actually very good. He has trouble with recall. Good luck figuring it all out.

 

My son has an almost perfect auditory memory. Teaching Company courses have been wonderful. I did Barton with him and he insisted on watching the (incredibly boring) tutoring videos and then proceeded to explain the rules to me.

 

My son is a weird paradox. He has a perfect auditory memory and understands very difficult subjects but has trouble finding words and recalling basic facts.

 

What has worked best for me is to work on strengths first and remediate weaknesses on a daily basis. Motivate with high level work and keep skill level work in small daily chunks.

 

My son's visual skills are not so great. He is an aural learner. But when he is recalling information he does it best on paper. (Not an Oral recaller).

 

The eides are a wonderful resource.

 

http://eideneurolearningblog.blogspot.com/

 

This book is great.

 

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1401308996?ie=UTF8&tag=neurolearni04-20&link_code=as3&camp=211189&creative=373489&creativeASIN=1401308996

 

and this book will be released tomorrow!

http://www.amazon.com/Dyslexic-Advantage-Unlocking-Hidden-Potential/dp/1594630798/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1313598158&sr=1-1

[PeterPan]

If you want to sort things out a bit yourself, get "The Mislabeled Child." Brainware Safari is for working memory, not visual processing, isn't it? I get things so mixed up.

 

Here's your trouble. You're scratching an iceberg. You're saying she has trouble writing and trouble with distraction. So it could be something like SPD leading to both. Then you need an OT. It could be ADD on top of that. Then you need the neuropsych. Could you start with one or another? Shrug. The OT told us to see the neuropsych (which we haven't done yet because frankly the price I got quoted was $2500 and that was from a place I didn't feel confident in.). The OT did all sorts of screening psych forms (they have these) that identified the executive dysfunction, ADD, etc. So just doing ONE thing, anything, will get you more information than you have. But the OT can't specifically legally give the psych label, can't do meds, can't describe the extent or split hairs. And the neuropsych can dig farther, pinpointing the part of the brain affected. Our OT wanted to use that info to then pinpoint the Interactive Metronome therapy. I wanted to get there, but we were just burning out last year.

 

So yes, you can get to the point where the neuropsych is confirming what you've already figured out, but you aren't there yet. And the official labels have value. And you may misread or totally miss certain components of the problem. If you don't mind, I'd like to REPEAT that. And you may misread or totally miss certain components of the problem.

 

Did your VT doc make any comments on tone, bilaterality, executive function, retained primitive reflexes, or other reasons to get an OT eval? Have you read anything about that yet? If you want to push off the big ticket eval, then start with OT with someone who does SPD. And really, to make a big caveat, I think it's a good bit of wisdom to go with the BEST practitioner you can find, irrespective of the label. If you can find a good neuropsych who does IM and knows a lot about homeschooling, then that would be where I'd start. If you find a terrific OT who does IM and a lot of SPD, then that's where I'd start. Just me.

[SophiaH]

 

My son is a weird paradox. He has a perfect auditory memory and understands very difficult subjects but has trouble finding words and recalling basic facts.

 

What has worked best for me is to work on strengths first and remediate weaknesses on a daily basis. Motivate with high level work and keep skill level work in small daily chunks.

 

 

Yes, this is dd. Thank you for the ideas!! Very helpful!

 

 

This book is great.

 

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1401308996?ie=UTF8&tag=neurolearni04-20&link_code=as3&camp=211189&creative=373489&creativeASIN=1401308996

 

and this book will be released tomorrow!

http://www.amazon.com/Dyslexic-Advantage-Unlocking-Hidden-Potential/dp/1594630798/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1313598158&sr=1-1

Thanks for the book ideas...I'll check them out!

[SophiaH]

OhE,

Brainware Safari is supposed to work on six areas including both visual memory and visual processing. The memory sections have really challenged her; I don't know if it's made a difference yet outside of the program, though...

 

The VT didn't make any other recommendations, or suggest any other therapy. Our nearby university's psych department does assessments for learning disabilities and ADD/ADHD according to their website. I assume that would cover the full spectrum including processing disorders that we've been discussing?

[PeterPan]

Call and talk with them. Would you be with a student if you went to the university?

[SophiaH]

I believe it would be with doctoral students, yes. Which is somewhat better than the ST ds did at the same uni that was with Masters Degree students--somewhat hit and miss each semester.